EDIT If you read the first unedited version of this, I am so so sorry – I got my files mixed up and uploaded the wrong one!
chapter iii
If Kurt were totally, one hundred percent honest with himself, he was really fed up of crushing on unavailable guys: if he wasn't straight, he was in a coma. So when Sam Evans walked into glee club about a month after his dad's heart attack with his bottle-blonde hair, dorky introduction and cute smile, he realised this was the perfect opportunity to not only get over Blaine but to potentially get an actual, real-life boyfriend too.
As Mr Schue babbled on about the deeper meaning of duets, Kurt nudged Mercedes and whispered, "He's on Team Gay. No straight boy dies his hair to look like Linda Evangelista circa 1993."
"You're crazy. Circa 2010."
They exchanged smirks and Kurt tuned back in to Mr Schue.
". . . and that is what duets are all about. So, this week, I want you to pair up and sing a duet. And, since you guys all seemed to love our little Defying Gravity diva off, I'm making this a competition." Geez, what the hell was with everyone bringing up Defying Gravity all of a sudden?
"What's the winner get?" Mike asked.
"Dinner for two, on me . . . at Breadstix."
The room erupted into excited chatter and Kurt looked back at Sam.
"Who are you gonna sing with, Kurt?" Mercedes asked him. Kurt looked at her and just smiled. She rolled her eyes in amusement, and then the bell rang and Mr Schue let them go. "Go get him, boy," she chuckled as Sam left the room.
"See you at lunch." Kurt winked at her, grabbed his satchel, and hurried after Sam. He had to catch up to the other boy before someone else got him to duet.
He saw Sam emptying his bag into his locker, smiled to himself, and walked over with a bounce in his step. And maybe he came on a little strong but Sam replied to his email of audio samples with a sounds gr8 dude ny ideas yet? so he went to bed happy.
"Blaine?" he called as he neared the Lake, noticing the other boy wasn't on the rock or on the ground.
"Over here!"
Kurt looked around and saw Blaine perching on some of the tree roots, his slacks pushed up to his knees so they wouldn't get wet.
Knees should not be allowed to look so appealing.
"Hey. What are you doing over here?"
Blaine shrugged. "I couldn't get comfy on the rock." He carefully stood up and took Kurt's hand to balance himself as he stepped back onto the grass.
Kurt hesitated. All day, he'd been telling himself (convincing himself) that he couldn't wait to see Blaine and tell him all about the duets competition and the new member of the New Directions who is super cute and might actually be gay, or at least bi. But faced with actually telling him? Looking at the ever-present upwards curve of his lips and the frizzy curls which tumbled into his wide, earnest (not sparkling, not beautiful, not stunning) eyes?
Not a chance. He skimmed over glee club, said he was still deciding his partner, and mostly the two boys sat with their bare feet dangling in the water, holding hands as they alternated between Broadway classics and companionable silence.
Despite his quite frankly ridiculous feeling of betrayal (he was not dating Blaine, because Blaine was in a coma and they'd never met in the Real World and Blaine didn't even feel the same way), Kurt was excited to sing with Sam. This would be his first duet sung with another boy which other people would see, after all, and he could still potentially get a boyfriend.
But apparently, the dwarf on the dark side of the moon couldn't let Kurt be happy for very long, because the next day Finn cornered him in the cafeteria.
"You can't do this to him," he said, and Kurt's stomach twisted painfully. "If he sings with you, you're painting a bulls-eye on his back."
It was surprisingly easy to keep his voice level as he retorted, "Once again, your closeted homophobia seeps to the surface like the contents of a crack cesspool."
"Don't give me that." Finn lowered his voice as he continued, "Look, I know I shouldn't have used that word in your basement but it's not like you were innocent. I really like you Kurt, but the fact of the matter is, you were all over me last year. If I did that to a girl, she'd take out a restraining order."
Like hell you would, you hypocritical oaf. "You have issues with me being gay, I get it."
"No, actually, I don't, I have issues with the fact that you don't understand that no means no."
He wanted to scream, "But you never said 'no'! You never told me to back off! The only thing you ever did to dissuade me was insult the bedroom I'd spent hours creating! Maybe you should have this conversation with Rachel too!"
He wanted to shout, "I have a crush on someone else! Someone who I know for sure is gay! Why don't you believe I can want to be platonic friends with a straight guy?"
Instead, he squashed down his hurt and said, "I just wanna sing with him."
"Then you don't give a damn about any of us." Finn paused for that to sink in, but all Kurt could think of was the way every single person he knew, every single one of those 'us', looked the other way when he slammed into a locker or a wall or the floor. "If he sings with you, I guarantee within a week, he'll take so much crap, he'll have to quit glee club. Your call, dude," he finished shortly and walked away.
Kurt breathed deeply, trying to ignore the stinging in his eyes. Maybe, he thought scathingly, he should just wear a sign saying, WILD GAY, APPROACH WITH CAUTION. Perhaps that would keep Finn – and every other straight male his existence seemed to offend – satisfied.
He looked down at his tray – it was all light food since he hadn't been feeling particularly hungry – but now, even the thought of eating anything made his stomach roll.
He dumped his food in the trash, left the cafeteria, and wished more than anything he could pick up the phone and Blaine would be on the other end of the line.
The dwarf on the dark side of the moon proved to be against him again later when he was talking to his dad. He would have been mortified that his dad found out about his crush on Finn but he was too busy being upset that Burt was on Finn's side. (Finn, Kurt couldn't help thinking with some resentment, who is the quarterback of the football team, eats like four horses and has two girls fighting over him, even though his flamboyancy had been a non-issue for months now.)
"You gotta understand, most guys don't know how to deal with unwanted advances." The from other guys hung bitterly in the air between them.
"So you're saying I shouldn't sing with this Sam guy because it might upset a couple of homophobes. I thought no one pushes the Hummels around!"
Burt sighed, and Kurt felt a little guilty they have to have this conversation while his dad was still barely allowed to leave the couch. But his dad had always supported Kurt, had been his rock ever since his mom died, from tea parties in their best clothes to fighting for his right to audition for a song originally sung by a woman; he couldn't help but think of this as a betrayal.
"No one does, I'm – I'm not saying that. I'm saying that maybe it's . . . you . . . who's pushing this kid Sam around trying to take advantage of him because you're interested in him."
Definitely a betrayal. One which would not be happening if he or Sam were a girl, because he was being a lot less pushy than Rachel had been last year with Finn while he was still with Quinn.
But at least Burt hadn't looked at him while he said it; Kurt didn't know if he could have taken that.
And then Blaine agreed with both of them, and Kurt was officially fed up. (He was also righteously pissed off and incredulous, because this was something Blaine should have agreed with!)
"Are you serious?" he demanded. "You really think it's so selfish of me to want to sing with another boy? It's not like I'm gonna be making out with him in front of the entire football team!"
Blaine looked a little queasy for a moment and then shook his head. "I didn't say that, Kurt, stop putting words in my mouth."
"You said that Finn and my dad might have a point," Kurt said sourly, and Blaine shook his head again.
"Only to an extent – which I would have been able to say had you not interrupted me." He raised an eyebrow at Kurt, who huffed and then slumped moodily where he was sitting. "If you lived in a more accepting town, I'd support you a hundred and ten percent. But McKinley sounds like my old high school with bonus slushies. I'm not encouraging you to play by the Straight Man's rules, but I do think you need to show a little discretion."
"So I should change who I am, or pretend to be someone else, so I don't chase the new guy away."
"I really admire you, Kurt." The abrupt, sincere confession surprised Kurt, and he sat up and looked at Blaine curiously. "If I still went to public high school, there's no way I would've had the courage to sing with another guy." A dark shadow passed over Blaine's face, his eyebrows furrowing, and then the moment was gone and Kurt wondered what had happened at Blaine's first school.
"So what do you suggest?" Kurt asked. His tone was still a little waspish, but the way Blaine's shoulders sagged infinitesimally with relief dissipated whatever bad mood was still lingering.
"It's a delicate situation you're in," Blaine mused, his hand brushing through the grass absentmindedly. "Two guys singing together probably won't get the best reception outside your club, but with the right song you shouldn't get too much crap for it."
Kurt didn't say anything, and Blaine fell silent to let Kurt think, for which he was grateful.
He'd got an email from Sam earlier saying that it didn't matter what other people thought, he'd agreed for them to sing together and he was a man of his word, so had he come up with any ideas yet? Kurt supposed that meant Finn had cornered Sam too, and his shoulders slumped again.
Sam was, in all probability, straight, and his willingness to sing with a guy who was flamboyant as well as gay was honourable. But it wasn't fair to make him deal with the inevitable backlash from singing a duet with the school gay. Bad enough Kurt had to deal with it.
"So no romance?" Kurt asked, trying to keep his voice light and his smile this side of rueful.
"No romance," Blaine agreed with a sigh, and his returning smile was sad.
The next day, Kurt found Sam in the locker room and broke off their deal. At least he managed to give him some haircare advice.
This did, however, leave him without a partner, and a mental rundown of the remaining glee club members left him a little morose. Predictably, the established couples were paired up; surprisingly, Mercedes and Santana were working together (to be honest, Kurt was really looking forward to hearing how they sounded together); the only person left was Quinn, and she'd stopped talking to him the moment she had her Cheerio uniform back and was no longer a fellow bottom-rung outcast.
When he announced his change of plans to the club, Sam had the graces to look guilty (even though it wasn't his fault, and Kurt was taken aback by how much he hoped they could at least become friends). Finn, the bastard, just looked relieved, and everyone else's sympathetic looks left him feeling strangely hollow. But he was a performer, and a damn good one, so he gave a truly spectacular rendition of Le Jazz Hot, talked cheerfully with his dad and Carole and Finn when the Hudsons came over for dinner, and only let his walls drop when he collapsed dramatically next to Blaine on his favourite rock.
"You okay, Kurt?" he asked, bemused.
"I let Sam go."
The atmosphere turned somber and Blaine looked guilty. (Why were all the wrong people feeling guilty? It wasn't Sam's fault or Burt's fault or Blaine's fault, but somehow they were the only people expressing any remorse.)
"It isn't because of what I said, was it?"
"Not really." Kurt smiled at his friend and patted his arm. "You and Dad had some very good points, and I needed that. I was being selfish – no, I was," he insisted, talking over Blaine's protest. "I was only thinking about how excited I was to be able to sing with another boy – you know, that other people know about – and so I wasn't thinking about Sam at all. It can't be easy being the new kid and being in glee, and singing with me would just have made his life needlessly difficult."
Blaine grasped his hand, his expression a mixture of admiration, regret and sympathy. Kurt offered him another smile, though this one felt forced.
"I'm hoping we can still be friends," he added. Blaine laughed, and his heart felt just a little bit lighter.
"I hope so too."
They talked mindlessly after that for a while, until Blaine splashed Kurt so much that Kurt really had no choice but to push the curly-haired boy into the Lake. Blaine broke the surface, face red as he spluttered with laughter.
"Oops." Kurt smiled innocently. And then suddenly he was falling, and then he was in the water as well. He pushed his sopping hair out of his face, and glared reproachfully at Blaine.
"Oops," he echoed.
"You're incorrigible. How many innocent people have you fooled with that Dalton uniform?"
"I'm offended you think I'm so dishonourable." But he was grinning, and Kurt laughed. With only a little bit of splashing and pushing each other back underwater, they swam over to the bank and hauled themselves out. Kurt used the abandoned blazer to squeeze out his hair while Blaine used his tie to wipe off his face.
They didn't really do much of anything, then – just lay back on the grass, looking up at the endlessly (boringly) blue sky until Kurt felt his body grow lighter. They exchanged a hug before Kurt hid somewhere to wake up, and his good mood carried him right through to the school hallway after second period when Karofsky almost slammed his fingers in his locker and he and Azimio gave him a double slushie.